Intel's 'Lincroft' Atom system-on-a-chip for handheld internet devices - including high-end smartphones - will clock to more than 1GHz, it has emerged.
The chip giant isn't saying what the part's 'standard' clock speed will be. The gigahertz frequency is what the chip - the main processing component of the upcoming 'Moorestown' …

COMMENTS

So does this mean...

With the extra bits put onto this Atom that it will beable to handle true HD (or 1080p)? That is what I am really intrested in, as I belive there is no current Atom based device that does, or not with out an external graphics card which sort makes 'system on a chip' pointless.

@Reg Sim; RE: So does this mean...

How about <1W first?

The competition next year will be 40nm dual core 800MHz Cortex-A9 using 0.5W (in total, not per core). Current Atoms need 2-4W per core. Let's see whether Intel can do less than 1W with one core close to 1GHz - now that would be an achievement.

This round will go to ARM as well

@Wilco 1: In addition the Cortex-A9 has higher performance per clock than the Atom, so the Atom will really need its Burst Performance Mode hackery to compete. In addition I am not convinced that Intel knows what a mobile SoC should be - i.e., a single chip (maybe a MCM for the RAM, like the iPhone) that incorporates all of the application processor needs.

I assume the article means "brick with a screen and phone" when it writes "high-end smartphone" in relation to Atom?

To be fair to Atom, I expect the next generation 800MHz Atom to use less power than the current generation, and to be far more aggressive (like a badger) in idle. The generation after (on 22nm) will be the one to look out for, that will be up against 28nm ARM Cortex A9s I expect.

The future

Overclocking?

When I were a lad, 'overclocking' meant pushing a chip above and beyond what it was warranted for by the manufacturer, sometimes beyond the bounds of stability.

Are we now saying that Intel are shipping chips which may not work at top speed, which may even be unstable? If not, where's the overclocking? I realise that most Windows systems wouldn't notice hardware instability if it hit them in the face, they'd usually quite rightly blame the OS, but users of phones based on something other than Windows Mobile might care.